flowing sleeves.
“I’m ravenous,” he exclaimed explanatorily. “I haven’t had anything
since day before yesterday at breakfast. I didn’t know I wanted
anything till I smelt it,—then I dressed and came down.”
“How sweet you look,” said Clover. “The effect of your pajama cuffs and
collar where one greedily expects curves and contour is lovely. Where
did you find that bath-robe?”
“In the bureau drawer,” said Burnett. “It appeared to have been hastily
shoved in there some time. I would have thought that it was a woman’s
something-or-other, only I found one of Jack’s cards in the pocket.”
They all began to laugh—Clover and Mitchell more heartily than the
owner of the card.
“Sit down,” said Mitchell finally with great cordiality. “You may as
well sit down while they mess you up some weak tea and wet toast.”
“Tea and toast?” cried the one in pink. “I’m good for dinner. _Um
Gotteswillen_, what do you suppose I came down for?”
“I wasn’t sure,” said his friend mildly; “you must admit yourself that
your attire is misleading. My book on social etiquette says nothing as
to when it is correct to wear a pink silk robe over blue and white
striped pajamas. However, there’s no denying your presence, and what
can’t be denied must be supplied, so what will you have?”
“Everything.”
Mitchell dived into the edibles generally and Burnett’s void was
provided with fulfillment.
“We were talking about Aunt Mary,” Clover said presently. “We were
saying that neither you nor she would be up to a coach or down to a
picnic for one while.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Burnett. “I feel up to pretty nearly anything
now that I can eat again. Pass over the horseradish, will you?”
“You’re one thing, my sweet pink friend,” said Clover gently, “but Aunt
Mary’s another. I’m not saying that New York has not had a wonderfully
Brown-Sequardesque effect on her, but I am saying that if she is to be
raised and lowered frequently, I want to travel with a portable crane.”
“Hum, hum, hum!” cried Jack. “May I just ask who did most of the heavy
labor of Aunt Mary yesterday?—As the man in the opera sings twenty
times with the whole chorus to back him—‘’Twas I, ’twas I, ’twas I,
’twas I—’”
“Hand over the toast, Clover,” said Burnett. “I don’t care who it
was—it was a success anyhow, for she’s upstairs and still alive, and I
say she’d enjoy coaching out Riverside way, and—” he choked.
“Slap him anywhere,” said Mitchell. “On his mouth would be the proper
place. Such poor manners,—coming down to a company lunch in another
man’s bath-robe and then trying to preach and eat dry toast at once.”
Burnett gasped and recovered.
“There,” said Clover, who had risen to administer the proposed slap,
“he’s off our minds and we may again pick up Aunt Mary and put her back
on.”
“We want to send her home in a blaze of glory,” said Jack thoughtfully.
“I want her to feel that the fun ran straight through.”
“That’s just what I mean,” interposed his particular friend; “we want
her to go home on the wings of a giant cracker, so to speak.”
“How would it do,” said Clover suddenly, “to just make a night of it
and take her along? Stock up, stack up, and ho! for it. You all know
the kind of a time I mean.”
“Clover,” said Jack gravely, “does it occur to you that Aunt Mary
belongs to me and that I have a personal interest in keeping her
alive?”
“Nothing ever occurs to him,” said Mitchell. “Occasionally an idea
bangs up against him inadvertently, and as it splinters a sliver or two
penetrate his head—that’s all.”
“I don’t see why the last sliver he felt wasn’t to the point,” said
Burnett, turning the cream jug upside down as he spoke. “I think she’d
enjoy it of all things. She enjoys everything so. I’ll guarantee that
when she gets back home she’ll even enjoy the yachting trip. Lots of
people are made like that. In the winter I always enjoy yachting,
myself. Pass me the hot bread.”
“Burnett,” said Mitchell warmly, “I wish that you would remember that a
collapse invariably follows an inflated market.”
“Is it Aunt Mary who is on the market, or myself?”
“You.”
“Oh, the rule is reversed in my case—the collapse went first. I’m only
inflating up to the usual limit again. Is there any gravy left?”
“No, there isn’t,” said Clover, looking in the dish, “there isn’t much
of anything left.”
“Let’s go to the library,” said Mitchell, rising abruptly. “It always
makes me ill to see goose-stuffing before Thanksgiving. Come on.”
“I’m done,” said Burnett, springing up and winding his lacey draperies
about his manly form. “Come on yourself; and once settled and smoking,
let us canvass the question and agree with Clover.”
“You know there are nights about town and nights about town,” said
Clover, as they climbed the staircase. “I do not anticipate that Aunt
Mary will bring up with a round turn in the police station, as her
young relative once did.”
“Well, that’s some comfort,” said Mitchell. “I did not feel sure as to
just where you did mean her to bring up. You will perhaps allow me to
remark that making a night of it with Aunt Mary in tow is a subject
that really is provocative of mature reflection. Making a night of it
is a frothy sort of a proposition in which our beloved aunty may not
beat up to quite the buoyancy of you and me.”
As he finished this sage remark they all re-entered the library and
grouped themselves around the table of smoking things.
“That’s what I say,” said Jack. “I think she’s much more likely to beat
out than to beat up—I must say.”
“I’ll bet you she doesn’t,” cried Burnett eagerly. “I’ll bet five
dollars that she doesn’t.”
“I declare,” said Clover, “what a thing a backer is to be sure. I feel
positive that Aunt Mary will go through with it now. I had my doubts
before, but never now. Six to five on Aunt Mary for the Three-year-old
Stakes.”
“The best way is to hit a happy medium,” said Mitchell thoughtfully,
scratching a match for the lighting of his new-rolled cigarette. “I
think the wisest thing would be for us just to take Aunt Mary and sally
forth and then keep it up until she must be put to bed. What say?”
“Well,” said Jack, reflectively, “I don’t suppose that taking it that
way, it would really be any worse than the other nights—”
“Worse!” cried Clover. “Hear him!—slandering those brilliant occasions,
everyone of which is a jewel in the crown of Aunt Mary’s bonnet.”
“We’ll begin by dining out,” said Burnett. “I’ll give the dinner. One
of the souvenir kind of affairs. A white mouse for every man and a
canary bird for the lady. We’ll have a private room and speeches and
I’ll get megaphones so we can make her hear without bustin’.”
“My dear boy,” said Mitchell, “where is this private room to be in
which the party can converse through megaphones? I had two deaf uncles
once who played cribbage with megaphones, but they were influential and
the rest of the family were poor. Circumstances alter cases. I ask
again where you can get a private dining-room for the use of five
people and four megaphones?”
“I’ll see,” said Burnett; “I wish,” he added irritably, “that you’d
wait until I finished before beginning to smash in like that, you knock
everything out of my head.”
“It’ll do you good to have a little something knocked out of you,” said
Mitchell gently. “It may enlarge your premises, give you a spare room
somewhere, so to speak. I should think that you’d need some spare room
somewhere after such a breakfast.”
“I’ll tell you what I think;” said Clover. “I think it’s a great
scheme. It’s a sort of pull-in-and-out, field-glass species of idea. We
can develop it or we can shut it off; in other words, we can parade
Aunt Mary or bring her home just when we darn please.”
“That’s what I said,” said Burnett. “Begin with my dinner, white mice
and all, and when all is going just let it slide until it seems about
time to slide off.”
“Yes,” said Mitchell dryly, “it’s always a good plan to slide on until
you slide off. It would be so easy to reverse the game.”
“And then, too,—” began Burnett.
“Excuse me,” said a voice at the door,—a woman’s voice this time.
It was Janice, very pretty in her black dress and white decorations,
hands in pockets, smile on lips.
“What’s up now?” the last speaker interrupted himself to ask, “Aunt
Mary?”
“No, she’s not up,” said the maid; “but she’s awake and wants to know
about the picnic.”
“There, what did I say!” cried Burnett; “isn’t she a hero? I tell you
Aunt Mary’d fight in the last ditch—she’d never surrender! She’s one of
those dead-at-the-gun chaps. I’m proud to think we have known the
companionship of joint yachting results.”
“She says she feels as well as ever,” said Janice, opening her eyes a
trifle as she noted Burnett’s pink silk negligée, “and wishes to know
when you want to start.”
“Bravo,” said Mitchell; “I, too, am fired by this exposition of pluck.
I like spirit. She reminds me of the horse who was turned out to grass
and then suddenly broke the world’s record.”
“What horse was that?” asked Burnett.
“Pegasus,” said Mitchell cruelly; “I didn’t say what kind of a record
he broke, did I?”
“What shall I tell Miss Watkins?” asked the maid.
Jack, who had risen at her entrance and gone to the window, faced
around here and said:
“Tell her that if she’ll dress we’ll go out bonnet-shooting and
afterwards drive in the park.”
Janice hesitated.
“She will surely ask where you are to dine,” said she, half-smiling.
Jack looked at the crowd.
“Fellows,” he said, “we must save up for to-morrow’s blow-out; suppose
you let Mitchell and me dine Aunt Mary somewhere very tranquilly
to-night and we’ll get her home by eleven.”
“Yes, do,” said Janice, with sudden earnest entreaty. “Honestly, there
is a limit.”
“Of course, there is a limit,” said Mitchell. “Even cities have their
limits. This one tried to be an exception, but San Francisco yelled
‘Keep off’ and she drew in her claws again. Aunt Mary, possessing many
points in common with New York, also possesses that. She has limits.
Her limits took in more than we bargained for,—for they have taken us
into the bargain. Still they are there, and we bow to necessity. A
cheerful drive, a quiet tea, early to bed. And _pax vobiscum_.”
“No wonder,” said Burnett, “it’s easy for you to agree when you’re to
be one of the dinner party.” “I don’t mind being left out,” said Clover
contentedly. “I shall sit on the sofa and whisper to ‘the one behind.’
Whispering is an art that I have almost forgotten, but inspired by that
pink—”
“Then I’ll tell Miss Watkins to dress for the going out,” said Janice,
pointedly addressing herself to Jack.
“Yes, please do.”
The maid left the room and went upstairs. Aunt Mary was tossing about
on her pillow.
“Well, what’s it to be?” she asked instantly.
“The storm has made it too wet to picnic,” replied Janice. “Mr. Denham
wants to take you to drive and afterwards you and Mr. Mitchell and he
are to dine—”
“And Burnett and Clover?” cried Aunt Mary in appalled interruption;
“where are they goin’?”
“Really, I don’t know.”
“I don’t like the idea,” said Aunt Mary; “we’d ought to all be
together. I never did approve of splittin’ up in small parties. Did
Jack say anythin’ about my gettin’ another bonnet?”
“Yes, he thought that you would go to a milliner first.”
“I don’t know about lookin’ sillier,” said Aunt Mary. “Strikes me a
woman can’t look more foolish than she does without a bonnet. However,
I don’t feel like makin’ a fuss over anythin’ to-day. I’ve had a good
rest and I feel fine. I’ll dress and go out with Jack, an’ I know one
thing, I’ll enjoy every minute I can, for this week is goin’ like
lightnin’ and when it’s over—well, you never saw Lucinda, so it’s no
use tryin’ to make you understand, but—” she drew a long breath and
shook her head meaningly.
Janice did not reply. She busied herself with the cares of the toilet
of her mistress, and when that was complete the carriage was summoned
for the shopping tour.
Jack saw that the bonnet was attended to first of all and then they
went to another store and purchased a scarf pin for Joshua and a
workbox for Lucinda. After that Aunt Mary decided that she wanted her
four friends each to have a souvenir of her visit, so she insisted upon
being conducted to that gorgeous establishment which is lighted with
diamonds instead of electricity and ordered four dressing-cases to be
constructed, everything with gold tops, to be engraved with the proper
initials and also the inscription, “from M.W. in memory of N.Y.” Jack
rather protested at this, asking her if she realized what the engraving
would come to.
“I don’t know,” said Aunt Mary recklessly and lavishly. “I don’t care
what it comes to either. It’s comin’ to me, anyhow, ain’t it? I rather
think so. Seems likely.”
The clerk took down the order, and then as he was ushering them
door-wards he fell by the wayside and craved permission to show some
tiaras of emeralds and some pearl dog-collars. Jack rebelled.
“You don’t want any of those,” he exclaimed, trying to propel her by.
“I ain’t so sure,” said Aunt Mary. “I might have a dog some day.”
But her nephew got her back into their conveyance, and they drove away.
It was so late that they could not consider the park and so had to make
a tour of Fifth Avenue to use up the time left before dinner. Then when
they headed toward the café they were delighted to observe Mitchell
awaiting them just where he was to have been.
“I see him,” said Aunt Mary. “My! I’d know him as far off as I’d know
anybody.” But then she sighed. “I wish the others were there, too,” she
said sadly; “seems awful—just three of us.”
The dinner which followed echoed her sentiment. It was a very nice
dinner, but painfully quiet, and Aunt Mary grew very restless.
“Seems like wastin’ time, anyhow,” she said uneasily. “I don’t see why
the others didn’t come. Well, can’t we go to Coney Island or the Statue
of Liberty or somewhere when we’re through?”
Mitchell looked at Jack.
“Why, you see, Aunt Mary,” the latter promptly shrieked, “we thought
we’d be good and go home early and sort of rest up to-night so as to
have a high old time to-morrow.”
Aunt Mary’s face, which had fallen during the first part of their
speech, brightened up at the last words.
“What are we goin’ to do?” she inquired with unfeigned interest.
“Burnett’s going to give us a dinner,” Jack answered, “and then
afterwards we’re going to help you see the town.”
“Oh!” said Aunt Mary. A pleasant gleam fled over her face.
“I never was a great believer in bein’ out nights,” she said, “but I
guess I’ll make an exception to-morrow. I might as well be doin’ that
as anythin’, I presume. Maybe better—very likely better.”
“Oh, very much better,” said Mitchell. “It is the exceptions that
furnish all the oil in life’s machinery. The exceptions not only
generally prove too much for the rule, but they also generally prevent
the rule from proving too much for us. They—”
“But I don’t see why we couldn’t go to two or three vaudevilles
to-night, too,” said the old lady, suddenly. “I feel so sort of
ready-for-anythin’.”
“You always feel that way, Miss Watkins,” screamed Mitchell. “It is we
that are the blind and the halt. You are ever fresh, but we falter and
faint. You see it’s you that go out, but it’s we that you get back.
You—”
“We could go to one vaudeville, anyway,” said Aunt Mary abstractedly;
“an’ if we saw any places that looked lively we could stop a few
minutes there on our way back. I’ve never been into lots of things
here.”
Jack looked at Mitchell this time.
“I’m sorry, Miss Watkins,” he roared, “but _I’ll_ have to go home,
anyhow. You see, I’m not used to the lively life which has been
enlivening us all this week and, being weakly in my knees, needs must
look out.”
Aunt Mary looked very disappointed.
“Then Jack and I’ll go, too,” she said, “but oh! dear, I do hate to
waste my stay in the city sleepin’ so much. I can sleep all I want
after I get home, but—” she paused, and then said with deep feeling,
“Well, you don’t understand about Lucinda an’ so you don’t understand
about anythin’.”
Both the young men felt truly regretful as they put her into the
carriage for the return trip. Her deep enjoyment was so genuine and
naive that they sympathized with her feelings when cut off from it.
But it was best that this one night should pass unimproved, and so all
five threw themselves into their respective beds with equal zest and
slept—and slept—and slept.
Chapter Seventeen
Aunt Mary’s Night About Town
The next day came up out of the ocean fair and warm, and when it drew
toward later afternoon no more propitious night for setting forth ever
happened.
It was undeniably a night to be remembered. And Aunt Mary’s
entertainers drew in deep breaths as they girded themselves for the
conflict. They certainly intended to do themselves proud and on top of
all the lesser “times of her life” to pile the one pre-eminent which
should rest pre-eminent forever. Aunt Mary had been gay in the first
part of the week,—gayer and gayer as the week progressed, but that
final crowning night was indubitably the gayest of all. If you doubt
this read on—read on—and be convinced.
They began with Burnett’s dinner in the private room. No matter where
the private room was, for it really wasn’t a private room at all—it was
a suite of rooms borrowed and arranged especially for that one
occasion. They gathered there at eight o’clock and began with oysters
served on a large brass tray in a half-dim Turkish room where incense
sticks burned about and queer daggers held up the curtains. The oysters
were served on their arrival and the megaphones stood like
extinguishers over each with the name cards tied to the small end. The
effect was really unique. Aunt Mary had one, too, and they were all
rejoiced at her delight in the scheme, and a few seconds after they
were doubly rejoiced over its success for no one had to speak loud—the
megaphones did it all, producing a lovely clamor which deafened all
those who could hear and caused Aunt Mary to feel that she heard with
the rest.
Amidst the cheerful din they exchanged such very wild remarks as
oysters always inspire and each and all were mutually content at the
effect thereof. Then they finished, and Burnett rose at once, flung
back the portières, and led them in upon their soup which stood smoking
on a large card table in the next room. There were boutonnières with
the soup, and violets for Aunt Mary, and again they used the megaphones
and again the conversation partook of the customary conversation which
soup produces.
The soup finished, Burnett jumped up again and threw back other
portières and they all moved out into a dining-room, with its table
spread with a substantial dinner. This time it was the real thing.
Candelabra, ice-pails, etc.
Aunt Mary had a parrot in a gilt tower, and all the men had white mice
in houses shaped like hat-boxes. Mitchell’s seat was flanked with wine
coolers, and Burnett’s, too. There was all that they could desire to
eat and drink and more. The feast began, and it was grand and glorious.
“I’ll tell you what,” said Aunt Mary, in the midst of the revel, “if
this is what it means in papers when it speaks of high livin’, I don’t
blame ’em for bein’ willin’ to die of it young. One week like this is
worth ten years with Lucinda. Twenty. A whole life.”
“Say, Jack,” said Burnett in an undertone, “let’s have Lucinda come to
town next and see the effect on her.”
“Miss Watkins,” said Clover through his megaphone, “as a mark of my
affection I beg to offer you my white mouse. Do you accept?”
“Oh, I don’t want to go back to the house yet,” said Aunt Mary, much
disturbed. “It’s too soon.”
“We won’t go home till morning,” said Burnett. “Not by a long shot.
Here, Mitchell, give us a speech. Home! we don’t want to _drink_ to it,
but we do want to drink to it _here_.”
“Home!” said Mitchell, rising with his glass in his hand. “Home! here’s
to home, and I’ll drink to it in anything but a cab. Home, Aunt Mary
and gentlemen, is the place where one may go when every other place is
closed. As long as any other place is open, however, I do not recommend
going home. The contrast is always sharp and bitter and to be avoided
until unavoidable circumstances, over which we possess but little
control, force us to give our address to the man who drives and let him
drive us to the last place on the map. And so I drink to that last
place—home; and here’s to it, not now, but a good deal later, and not
then unless what must be has got to result.”
Mitchell paused and they all drank.
“Me next now,” exclaimed Burnett, jumping to his feet. “I’m going to
make a speech at my own dinner, and as a good speech is best made
off-hand, I’ve picked out an off-hand subject and arise to give you
‘Lucinda.’ Having never met her I feel able to say nothing good about
her and I call the company present to witness that I shall say nothing
bad either. I gather from what I have had a stray chance of picking up
that Lucinda is all that she should be, and nothing frisqué. The latter
quality is too bad, but it’s not my fault. Therefore, I say again
‘Lucinda’, and here’s to her very good health. May she never regret
that Fate has given her no chance to have anything to regret.”
Aunt Mary applauded this speech heartily even if she hadn’t quite
caught the whole of it and had no idea of whom it was about.
“Who’s goin’ to speak now?” she asked anxiously.
“I am,” said Clover modestly. “I rise to propose the health of our
honored guest, Miss Watkins. We all know what kin she is to one of us,
and we all weep that she didn’t do as well by the rest of us. Aunt
Mary! Glasses down!”
“You can’t drink this, you know, Aunt Mary,” said Jack,—“it’s bad taste
to drink to yourself.”
“I don’t want to drink,” said Aunt Mary, beaming,—“I like to watch
you.”
“Here’s to Aunt Mary’s liking to watch us!” cried Clover.
“No,” said Burnett rising, “don’t. It’s time to go and get the salad
now.”
“We’d ought to have the automobile for this party,” said Aunt Mary, and
everyone applauded her idea, as they rose and gathered up their
belongings.
It was a droll procession of men with mice and a lady with a parrot
that got under way and moved in among the Japanese fans and swinging
lanterns of the next room in the suite of Burnett’s friend. Five little
individual tables were laid there and on each table lay a Japanese
creature of some sort which—being opened somewhere—revealed salad
within.
“Well, I never did!” exclaimed the guest; “this dinner ought to be put
in a book!”
“We’ll put it in ourselves first,” said Mitchell. “I never believe in
booking any attraction until it has been tried on a select few. Burnett
having selected me for one of this few, I vote we begin on the salad.”
They began forthwith.
Aunt Mary suddenly stopped eating.
“Some one called,” she said.
“It’s the parrot,” said Jack; “I heard him before.”
“What does he say?” said Mitchell.
“Listen and you’ll find out,” said Jack.
They all listened and presently the parrot said solemnly:
“Now see what you’ve done!” and relapsed into silence.
“What does he mean?” Aunt Mary asked.
“He’s referring to his own affairs,” said Burnett; “come on—let’s get
coffee now!”
They all adjourned to a tiny room lined with posters and decorated with
pipe racks, and there had ice cream in the form of bulls and bears, and
coffee of the strongest variety. And then cordials and cigarettes.
“Now, where shall we go to first?” asked Burnett when all were well lit
up. No one would have guessed that he had ever felt used up in all his
life before.
“To a roof garden,” said Mitchell. “We’ll go to a roof garden first,
and then we’ll go to more roof gardens, and after that if the spirit
moves we’ll go to yet a few roof gardens in addition. We’ll show our
dear aunt what wonders can be done with roofs, and to-morrow she’ll
wonder what was done with her.”
“That’s the bill,” said Clover, “and let’s go now. I can see from the
general manner of my mouse that he’s dying to get out and make his way
in the wide world.”
“Mine the same,” said Mitchell; “by George, it worries me to see such
restless, feverish manners in what I had supposed would be a quiet
domestic companion. It presages a distracted existence. But come on.”
They all rose.
“Where are we goin’ now?” asked Aunt Mary.
“To a roof garden,” said Jack, “and we’re going to take the whole
menagerie, Aunt Mary. We’re going to get put in the papers. That’s the
great stunt,—to get put in the papers.”
“But we’ll leave the megaphones,” said Mitchell. “I won’t go about with
a mouse and a megaphone. People might think I looked silly. People are
so queer.”
“Put the mouse in the megaphone,” suggested Burnett. “That’s the way my
mother taught me to pack when I was a kid. You put your tooth brush in
a shoe, and the shoe in a sleeve and then turn the sleeve inside out.
Oh, I tell you—what is home without a mother?—Put the mouse in the
megaphone and stop up both ends. What are your hands and your mouth
for?”
“Yes,” said Mitchell, “I think I see myself so handling a megaphone
that the mouse doesn’t run out either end or into my mouth. My mouth is
a good mouth and it’s served me well and I won’t turn it over to a
mouse at this late day.”
“Let’s keep the mice in their cages,” said Clover, and as he spoke he
dropped his.
“Now see what you’ve done!” said the parrot.
“I didn’t hurt it,” said Clover. “Come on now.”
“Yes, come on,” said Burnett. “It’s long after ten o’clock. You want to
remember that even roof gardens are not eternally on tap.”
“Well, I’m trying to hurry all I can,” said Mitchell. “I’m the picture
of patience scurrying for dear life only unable to lay hands on her
gloves.”
“I don’t catch what’s the trouble,” said Aunt Mary to Jack.
[Illustration: “The carriage stopped three hundred feet below the
level of a roof-garden.”]
“Nothing’s the trouble,” said Jack, “everything’s fine and dandy. We’re
going out now. Time of your life, Aunt Mary, time of your life!”
They telephoned for a carriage and all got in. Then Clover slammed the
door.
“Now see what you’ve done!” said the parrot.
“Is he going to keep saying that?” Burnett asked.
“I don’t know,” said Jack. “It comes in pretty pat, don’t it?”
“Makes me think of my mother,” said Clover. “I wish it wouldn’t.”
“I don’t catch who’s sayin’ what,” said Aunt Mary.
“Nobody’s saying anything, Miss Watkins,” roared Mitchell; “we are all
talking airy nothings just to pass the time o’ day.”
The carriage stopped three hundred feet below the level of a roof
garden.
“We get out here,” said Burnett.
They all got out and went up in an elevator.
“Seems to be a good many goin’ to the same place,” said Aunt Mary.
“Yes,” said Mitchell, “a good many people generally go to places that
are great places for a good many people to go to.”
“You ought not to end with a preposition,” said Clover.
“There, I left my ear-trumpet in the carriage!” said Aunt Mary.
There was a pause of consternation. No one spoke except the parrot.
“We know what she’s done without your telling us,” said Clover,
addressing the bird. “The question is what to do next?”
Jack went back downstairs and found the carriage waiting in hopes of
picking up another load. He lost no time in personally picking up the
ear-trumpet and returning to his friends.
Then they all proceeded above and bought a table and turned their
chairs to the stage, where the attraction just at that moment was a
quartette of pretty girls.
“I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” said Burnett the instant the girls began
to sing. “Let’s each tie a card to a mouse and present them to the
girls!”
The suggestion found favor and was followed out to the letter. But when
the girls were through and the Chinaman who followed them on the
programme was also over, the pleasures of life in that spot palled upon
the party.
“Oh, come,” said Burnett, “let’s go somewhere else. Let’s go out in the
air.”
His suggestion found favor. And they sallied forth and visited another
roof garden, a theater where they saw the last quarter of the fourth
act, a place where Aunt Mary was given a gondola ride, and a place
where she was given something in the shape of light refreshments.
Then, becoming thirsty, they ordered a few White Horses and Red Horses
and the Necks of yet other horses, but Aunt Mary declined the horses of
all colors and Mitchell upheld her.
“That’s right,” he said, “I’m a great believer in knowing when you’ve
had enough, and I’m sure you’ve all had so much too much that I know
that I must have had enough and that she’s better off with none at
all.”
“I reckon you’re right,” said Clover. “I’ve had enough, surely. I can’t
see over my pile of little saucers, and when I can’t see over my pile
of little saucers I’m always positive that I’ve had enough.”
Jack laughed and then ceased laughing and drew down the corners of his
mouth.
“Why do people sit on chairs?” Clover asked just then. “Why don’t
everyone sit on the floor? You never feel as if you might slip off the
floor.”
“Ah,” said Mitchell, “if we were not always trying to rise above Nature
we should all be sitting where Nature intended,—when we weren’t
swinging by our tails and picking cocoanuts.”
“Come on and let’s go somewhere else,” said Burnett. “Every time I look
at somebody it’s someone else and that makes me nervous.”
“Now see what you’ve done!” said the parrot.
“Did you know his long suit when you bought him?” Clover asked Burnett.
“No,” said Burnett; “they told me that he didn’t use slang and that was
all.”
It was well along in the evening—or night—and a brisk discussion arose
as to where to go next.
“I’ll tell you,” said Clover, “we’ll take a ride. Let me see what time
is it?—12.30. Just the time for a drive. We’ll take three cabs and
sally forth and drive up and down and back and forth in the cool night
air.”
“And jews-harps!” cried Burnett. “Oh, I say, there’s a bully idea!
We’ll go to a drug store and buy some jews-harps and play on them as we
drive along. We’ll each sing our own tune, and the effect will be so
novel. Let’s do it.”
“Jews-harps—” said Clover thoughtfully, “jews-harps for three
cabs—that’ll make—let me see—that’ll make—” he hesitated.
“Oh, the driver will make the change,” said Burnett impatiently. “Come
on. If we’re going to have the cabs and jews-harps it’s time to get out
and take the stump in the good cause.”
“Where’s my ear-trumpet?” said Aunt Mary, blankly,—“it’s been left
somewhere.”
“No, it hasn’t,” said Mitchell. “It’s here! I’m holding it for you.
It’s much easier holding it than picking it up. It seems so slippery
to-night.”
“I’m not going out to get the cabs,” said Clover. “I thought of the
idea and someone else must work it out. I’m opposed to working after
time and I call time at midnight.”
Mitchell rose with a depressed air.
“I’ll go,” he said. “I feel the need of a walk. When I feel the need of
anything I always take it and I’ve needed and taken so freely to-night
that I need to take a walk to—”
“I don’t think it funny to talk that way,” said Burnett a little
heatedly. “If you want to get the cabs why get the cabs. I’m going to
get them, too, and I reckon we can get them combined just as easy as
alone.”
“I will go with you,” said his friend solemnly. “I will accompany you
because I feel the need—” He stopped and turned his hat over and over.
“I know there’s a hole to put my head into,” he declared, “but I can’t
just put my hand—I mean my head—on to—I mean, into—it.”
“Do you expect to find a brass hand pointing to it?” said Burnett
testily. “Come on!”
“Three cabs and five—or was it six?—jews-harps?” continued Mitchell
dreamily. “It must have been six, five for we five, and one for Lord
Chesterfield—but where is Lord Chesterfield?” he asked suddenly with a
disturbed glance around. “I hope he hasn’t deserted and gone home.”
“Come on, come on!” said Burnett. “There won’t be a sober cab left if
we don’t hurry while everything is still able to stand up.”
This reasoning seemed to alarm Mitchell and he went out with him at
once.
“My head feels awfully,” said Clover to Jack. “It sort of grinds and
grates—does yours?”
Jack stared straight ahead and made no reply.
“I’m goin’ home no more to roam,” said Aunt Mary slowly and sadly,—“I’m
goin’ home no more to roam, no more to sin an’ sorrow. I’m goin’ home
no more to roam—I’m goin’ home to-morrow. O hum!” She heaved a heavy
sigh.
“Now see what you’ve done!” said the parrot with emphasis.
“Never mind,” said Clover bitterly. “Better people than you have gone
home before now; I used to do it myself before I was old enough to know
worse. Will you excuse me if I say, ‘Damn this buzzing in my head?’”
“I know how you feel,” said Aunt Mary sympathetically. “Don’t you want
me to ring for the porter and have him make up your berth right away?”
Clover didn’t seem to hear. His eyes were roving moodily about the
room; they looked almost as faded as his mustache.
“Seems to me they’re gone a long time,” said Jack presently, twisting a
little in his seat. “It never takes me so long to get a cab. I hold up
my hand—the man stops—and I get in—what’s the matter, Aunt Mary?” He
asked the question in sudden alarm at seeing Aunt Mary bury her face
hastily in her handkerchief.
“What’s the matter?” he repeated loudly.
“Don’t mind me,” said Aunt Mary sobbing. “It’s just that I happened to
just think of Lu—Lu—Lucinda—and somehow I don’t seem to have no
strength to bear it.”
“Split the handkerchief between us,” said Clover. “I want to cry, too,
and there’s no time like the present for doing what you want to do.”
“Rot!” said Jack, “look here—”
He was interrupted by the return of the embassy, Mitchell bearing the
jews-harps.
“What’s the matter?” Burnett asked.
“Nothing,” said Clover; “we were so worried over you, that’s all.”
Burnett called for the bill and found that he had run out of cash; “Or
maybe I’ve had my pocket picked,” he suggested. “I’m beginning to be in
just the mood in which I always get my pocket picked.”
Jack produced a roll of bills and settled for the refreshments. Then
they all started down stairs as Aunt Mary wouldn’t risk an elevator
going down.
“It’s all right comin’ up,” she said, “but if it broke when you were
going down where’d you be?”
“In the elevator,” said Clover. “I’d never jump, I know that.”
“Oh, I’ve left my ear-trumpet,” said Aunt Mary.
“Let’s draw lots to see who goes back?” Burnett suggested.
They drew and the lot fell to Clover.
“I’m not going back,” he said coldly. “I haven’t got the energy. Let
her apply the megaphone.”
Jack went back.
Then they all got into the street and into the cabs. Aunt Mary and Jack
went first, Mitchell and Burnett second, and Clover brought up the rear
alone.
They set off and it must be admitted that the effect of the three cabs
going single file one after another with their five occupants giving
forth a most imperfect version of his or her favorite tune, was at once
novel and awe-inspiring. But like all sweet things upon this earth the
concert was not of long endurance. It was only a few minutes before the
duos ceased utterly to duo and the soloist in the rear fell sound
asleep. For several blocks there was a mournful and tell-tale lack of
harmony upon the air and then the three young men seemed to have
exhausted their mouths and all lapsed into a more or less conscious
state of quietude.
Only Aunt Mary was indefatigable. Like Cleopatra, age seemed to have no
power to stale her infinite variety, and leaning back in her own corner
she continued to placidly and peacefully intone with disregard for time
and tune which never ruffled a wrinkle. She hadn’t played on a
jews-harp in sixty years, and being deaf she was pleasantly astonished
at how well she still did it. Jack leaned in his corner with folded
arms; he was deeply conscious of wishing that it was the next day—any
day—any other day—for the week had been a wearing one and he could not
but be mortally glad that it was so nearly over. The task of fitting
the plan of Aunt Mary’s revelries to the measure of her personal
capacity had been a very hard one and his soul panted for relief
therefrom. It is one thing to undertake a task and another thing to
persevere to its successful completion. Aunt Mary’s nephew was
tired—very tired.
A little later he felt a weight against him; he looked; it was Aunt
Mary’s head,—she was oblivious there on his bosom.
He heard a voice; it was the parrot.
“Now see what you’ve done,” it said in sepulchral tones.
They reached the house, bore the honored guest within, and delivered
her to Janice.
“You can have that parrot,” Jack called back to the cabman. “He’s
guaranteed against slang.”
The cabman drove away.
Janice received them with a look which might have been construed in
many ways, but they were all far past construing and the look fell to
the ground unheeded.
And again Aunt Mary was tucked carefully up to dream herself rested
once more.
Chapter Eighteen
A Departure And A Return
The next day poor Aunt Mary had to undergo the ordeal of being obliged
to turn her face away from all those joys which had so suddenly and
brilliantly altered the hues of life for her. It pretty nearly used her
up. She took her reviving decoction with tears standing in her
eyes,—and sat down the glass with a bursting sigh. “My, but I wish I
knew when I’d be taking any more of this?” she said to Janice.
“Oh, you’ll come back to the city some day,” said the maid hopefully.
“Come back!” said Aunt Mary. “Well, I should say that I would come
back! Why—I—?” she stopped suddenly, “never mind,” she said after a
minute, “only you’ll see that I’ll come back. Pretty surely—pretty
positively.”
Janice was folding her dresses into the small trunk. Aunt Mary
contemplated the green plaid waist with an air of mournful reflection.
“I believe I’ll always keep that waist rolled away,” she murmured. “I
shall like to shake it out once in a while to remind me of things.”
“Hand me my purse,” she said to the maid five minutes afterwards.
“Here’s twenty-five dollars an’ I want you to take it and get anythin’
you like with it.”
“But that’s too much,” Janice cried, putting her hands behind her and
shaking her head.
“Take it,” said Aunt Mary imperiously; “you’re well worth it.”
“I don’t like to—truly,” said the girl.
“Take it,” said Aunt Mary sternly.
So Janice took it and thanked her.
The train went about 4 p.m., and it seemed wise to give the traveller a
quiet luncheon in her own room and rally her escort afterwards.
When she had eaten and drank she sighed again and thoughtfully folded
her napkin.
“I’ve had a nice time,” she said, gazing fixedly out of the window.
“I’ve had a nice time, and I guess those young men have enjoyed it,
too. I rather think my bein’ here has given them a chance to go to a
good many places where they’d never have thought of goin’ alone. I’m
pretty sure of it.”
Janice made no reply.
“But it’s all over now,” said Aunt Mary with something that sounded
suspiciously like a sob in her voice, “an’ I haven’t got only just one
consolation left an’ that’s—” again she paused.
Janice carried the tray away and the next minute they all burst in
bearing their parting gifts in their arms.
The gifts were an indiscriminate collection of flowers, candy,
magazines, books, etc.
Aunt Mary opened her closet door and showed the four dressing-cases.
Everyone but Jack was mightily surprised and everyone was mightily
pleased. The room looked like Christmas, and the faces, too.
“I shall die with my head on the hair brush,” Clover declared, and
Mitchell went down on his knees and kissed Aunt Mary’s hand.
“You must all come an’ see me if you ever go anywhere near,” said the
old lady. “Now promise.”
“We promise,” they yelled in unison, and then they asked in beautiful
rhythm “What’s the matter with Aunt Mary?” and yelled the answer “She’s
all right!” with a fervor that nearly blew out the window.
“I declare,” Aunt Mary exclaimed, as the echoes settled back among the
furniture, “when I think of Lucinda seems as if—” she paused; further
speech was for the nonce impossible.
“The carriages are ready,” Janice announced at the door, and from then
until they reached the train all was confusion and bustle.
Only the train whistle could drown the farewells which they poured into
her ear-trumpet, and when they could hover in her drawing-room no
longer they stood outside the window as long as the window was there to
stand outside of. And then they watched it until it was out of sight,
and after that turned solemnly away.
“By grab!” said Burnett, “I think she ought to leave us _all_ fortunes.
I never was so completely done up in my life.”
“My throat’s blistered,” said Clover feebly; “I’m going to stand on my
head and gargle with salve until my throat’s healed.”
“I shall never shine on the team again,” said Mitchell. “I shall hire
out for bleacher work. He who has successfully conversed with Aunt Mary
need not fear to attack a Wagner Opera single-handed.”
Jack did not say anything. His heart was athirst for Mrs. Rosscott.
She was back in her own library the next night, and he rushed thither
as soon as his first day’s labor was over. She was prettier and her
eyes were sweeter and brighter than ever as she rose to meet him and
held out—first one hand, and then both. He took the one hand and then
the two and the longing that possessed him was so overwhelming that
only his acute consideration for all she was to him kept him from
taking more yet.
“And the week’s over,” she said, when she had dragged her fingers out
of his and gone and nestled down upon the divan, among the pillows that
rivaled each other in their attempts to get closer to her, “the week’s
all over and our aunt is gone.”
“Yes,” he said, rolling his favorite chair up near to her seat, “all is
over and well over.”
She smiled and he smiled too.
“She must have enjoyed it,” she said thoughtfully.
“Enjoyed it!” said Jack. “She won’t like Paradise in comparison.”
“And you’ve been a good boy,” said Mrs. Rosscott, regarding him
merrily. “You’ve played your part well.”
He rose to his feet and put his hand to his temple.
“I salute my general,” he said. “I was well trained in the maneuver.”
“It’s odd,” said Mrs. Rosscott thoughtfully. “It was really so simple.
We are only women after all, whether it is I—or Aunt Mary—or all the
rest of the world. We do so crave the knowledge that someone cares for
us—for our hours—for our pleasures. It isn’t the bonbons—it’s that
someone troubled to buy the bonbons because he thought that they would
please us.”
“Doesn’t a man have the same feeling?” Jack asked. “It isn’t the tea we
come for—it’s the knowledge that someone bothers to make it and sugar
it and cream it.”
“I wasn’t laughing,” said she.
“I wasn’t laughing either,” said he.
“But it’s true,” she went on, “and I think the solution of many unhappy
puzzles lies there. Don’t forget if you ever have a wife to pay lots of
attention to her.”
“I always have paid lots of attention to her, haven’t I?” he demanded.
Mrs. Rosscott shook her head.
“We won’t discuss that,” she said. “We’ll stick to Aunt Mary. Aunt Mary
is a rock whose foundation is firm; when it comes to your relations
toward other women—” she stopped, shrugging her shoulders, and he
understood.
“But it’s going to come out all right now, I’m sure,” she went on after
a minute, “and I’m so glad—so very glad—that the chance was given to me
to right the wrong that I was the cause of.”
[Illustration: “‘And now the fun’s all over and the work begins,’ she
said, looking down.”]
He looked at her and his eyes almost burned, they were so strong in
their leaping desire to fling himself at her feet and adore her
goodness and sweetness and worldliness and wisdom from that
vantage-ground of worship.
She choked a little at the glance and put her hands together in her lap
with a quick catching at self-control.
“And now the fun’s all over and the work begins,” she said, looking
down.
“I know that,” he asseverated.
She lifted up her eyes and looked at him so very kindly. And then—after
a little pause to gain command of word and thought she spoke again,
slowly.
“Listen,” she said, this time very softly, but very seriously. “I want
to tell you one thing and I want to tell it to you now. I had a good
and sufficient reason for helping you out with Aunt Mary; but—” She
hesitated.
“But?” he asked.
“But I’ve no reason at all for helping your Aunt Mary out with you,
unless you prove worthy of her, and—”
“And?”
She looked at him, and shook her head slightly.
“I won’t say ‘and of me,’” she said finally.
“Why not?” he asked, a storm of tempestuous impatience raging behind
his lips. “Do say it,” he pleaded.
“No, I can’t say it. It wouldn’t be right. I don’t mean it, and so I
won’t say it. I’ll only tell you that I can promise nothing as things
are, and that unless you go at life from now on with a tremendous
energy I never shall even dream of a possible promising.”
He rose to his feet and towered above her, tall and straight and
handsome, and very grave.
“All right,” he said simply. “I’ll remember.”
Ever so much later that evening he rose to bid her good-night.
“Whatever comes, you’ve been an angel to me,” he said in that hasty
five seconds that her hand was his.
“Shall I ever regret it?” she asked, looking up to his eyes.
“Never,” he declared earnestly, “never, never. I can swear that, and I
shall be able to swear the same thing when I’m as old as my Aunt Mary.”
Mrs. Rosscott lowered her eyes.
“Who could ask more?” she said softly.
“I could,” said Jack—“but I’ll wait first.”
Chapter Nineteen
Aunt Mary’s Return
Joshua was at the station to meet his mistress, and Lucinda, full to
the brim with curiosity, sat on the back seat of the carryall.
Aunt Mary quitted the train with a dignity which was sufficiently
overpowering to counteract the effect of her bonnet’s being somewhat
awry. She greeted Joshua with a chill perfunctoriness that was
indescribable, and her glance glided completely over Lucinda and faded
away in the open country on the further side of her.
Lucinda did not care. Lucinda was of a hardy stock and stormy glances
neither bent nor broke her spirit.
“I’m glad to see you come back looking so well,” she screamed, when
Aunt Mary was in and they were off.
Aunt Mary raised her eyebrows in a manner that appeared a trifle
indignant, and riveted her gaze on the hindquarters of the horse.
“I thought it was more like heaven myself,” she said coldly. “Not that
your opinion matters any to me, Lucinda.”
Then she leaned forward and poked the driver.
“Joshua!” she said.
Joshua jumped in his seat at the asperity of her poke and her tone.
“What is it?” he said hastily.
“Jus’ ’s soon as we get home I want you to take the saw—that little,
sharp one, you know—and dock Billy’s tail. Cut it off as close as you
can; do you hear?”
“I hear,” was the startled answer.
“Did you have a good time?” Lucinda had the temerity to ask, after a
minute.
“I guess I could if I tried,” the lady replied; “but I’m too tired to
try now.”
“How did you leave Mr. Jack?”
“I couldn’t stay forever, could I?” asked the traveler impatiently. “I
thought that a week was long enough for the first time, anyhow.”
Lucinda subsided and the rest of the drive was taken in silence. When
they reached the house Aunt Mary enveloped everything in one glance of
blended weariness, scorn and contempt, and then made short work of
getting to bed, where she slept the luxurious and dreamless sleep of
the unjust until late that afternoon.
“My, but she’s come back a terror!” Lucinda cried to Joshua in a high
whisper when he brought in the trunk. “She looks like nothin’ was goin’
to be good enough for her from now on.”
“Nothin’ ain’t goin’ to be good enough for her,” said Joshua calmly.
“What are we goin’ to do, then?” asked Lucinda.
“We’ll have enough to do,” said Joshua, in a tone that was portentous
in the extreme, and then he placed the trunk in its proper position for
unpacking and went away, leaving Lucinda to unpack it.
Aunt Mary awoke just as the faithful servant was unrolling the green
plaid waist, and the instant that she spoke it was plain that her
attitude toward life in general was become strangely and vigorously
changed, and that for Lucinda the rack was to be newly oiled and
freshly racking.
This attitude was not in any degree altered by the unexpected arrival
of Arethusa that evening. Strange tales had reached Arethusa’s ears,
and she had flown on the wings of steam and coal dust to see what under
the sun it all meant. Aunt Mary was not one bit rejoiced to see her and
the glare which she directed over the edge of the counterpane bore
testimony to the truth of this statement.
“Whatever did you come for?” she demanded inhospitably. “Lucinda didn’t
send for you, did she?”
Arethusa screamed the best face that she could onto her visit, but Aunt
Mary listened with an inattention that was anything but flattering.
“I don’t feel like talkin’ over my trip,” she said, when she saw her
niece’s lips cease to move. “Of course I enjoyed myself because I was
with Jack, but as to what we did an’ said you couldn’t understand it
all if I did tell you, so what’s the use of botherin’.”
Arethusa looked neutral, calm and curious. But Aunt Mary frowned and
shook her head.
“S’long as you’re here, though, I suppose you may as well make yourself
useful,” she said a few minutes later. “Come to think of it, there’s an
errand I want you to do for me. I want you to go to Boston the very
first thing to-morrow morning an’ buy me some cotton.”
Arethusa stared blankly.
“Well,” said the aunt, “if you can’t hear, you’d better take my
ear-trumpet and I’ll say it over again.”
“What kind of cotton?” Arethusa yelled.
“Not _stockin’s!_” said Aunt Mary; “Cotton! Cotton! C-O-T-T-O-N! It
beats the Dutch how deaf everyone is gettin’, an’ if I had your ears in
particular, Arethusa, I’d certainly hire a carpenter to get at ’em with
a bit-stalk. Jus’s if you didn’t know as well as I do how many
stockin’s I’ve got already! I should think you’d quit bein’ so
heedless, an’ use your commonsense, anyhow. I’ve found commonsense a
very handy thing in talkin’ always. Always.”
Arethusa launched herself full tilt into the ear-trumpet.
“What—kind—of—cotton?” she asked in that key of voice which makes the
crowd pause in a panic.
Aunt Mary looked disgusted.
“The Boston kind,” she said, nipping her lips.
Arethusa took a double hitch on her larynx, and tried again.
“Do you mean thread?”
Aunt Mary’s disgust deepened visibly.
“If I meant silk I guess I wouldn’t say cotton. I might just happen to
say silk. I’ve been in the habit of saying silk when I meant silk and
cotton when I meant cotton, for quite a number of years, and I might
not have changed to-day—I might just happen to not have. I might not
have—maybe.”
Arethusa withered under this bitter irony.
“How many spools do you want?” she asked in a meek but piercing howl.
“I don’t care,” said Aunt Mary loftily. “I don’t care how many—or what
color—or what number. I just want some Boston cotton, and I want to see
you settin’ out to get it pretty promptly to-morrow morning.”
“But if you only want some cotton,” Arethusa yelled, with a force which
sent crimson waves all over her, “why can’t I get it in the village?”
Aunt Mary shot one look at her niece and the latter felt the
concussion.
“Because—I—want—you—to—get—it— in—Boston,” she said, filling the breaks
between her words with a concentrated essence of acerbity such as even
she had never displayed before. “When I say a thing, I mean it pretty
generally. Quite often—most always. I want that cotton and it’s to be
bought in Boston. There’s a train that goes in at seven-forty-five, and
if you don’t favor the idea of ridin’ on it you can take the express
that goes by at six-five.”
Arethusa pressed her hands very tightly together and carried the
discussion no further. She went to bed early and rose early the next
morning and Joshua drove her in town to the seven-forty-five.
“It doesn’t seem to me that my aunt is very well,” the niece said
during the drive. “What do you think?”
“I don’t think anything about her,” said Joshua with great candor. “If
I was to give to thinkin’ I’d o’ moved out to Chicago an’ been scalpin’
Indians to-day.”
“I wonder if that trip to New York was good for her?” Arethusa wondered
mildly.
Joshua flicked Billy with the whip and refused to voice any opinion as
to New York’s effect on his mistress.
Arethusa was well on her way to Boston when Aunt Mary’s bell, rung with
a sharp jangle, summoned Lucinda to open her bedroom blinds. While
Lucinda was leaning far out and attempting to cause said blinds to
catch on the hooks, which habitually held them back against the side of
the house, her mistress addressed her with a suddeness which showed
that she had awakened with her wits surprisingly well in hand.
“Where’s Joshua? Is he got back from Arethusa? Answer me, Lucinda.”
Lucinda drew herself in through the open window with an alacrity
remarkable for one of her years.
“Yes, he’s back,” she yelled.
Aunt Mary looked at her with a sort of incensed patience.
“Well, what’s he doin’? If he’s back, where is he? Lucinda, if you knew
how hard it is for me to keep quiet you’d answer when I asked things.
Why in Heaven’s name don’t you say suthin’? Anythin’? Anythin’ but
nothin’, that is.”
“He’s mowin’,” Lucinda shrieked.
“Sewin’!” exclaimed Aunt Mary. “What’s he sewin’? Where’s he sewin’?
Have you stopped doin’ his darnin’?”
Lucinda gathered breath by compressing her sides with her hands, and
then replied, directing her voice right into the ear-trumpet:
“He’s mowin’ the back lawn.”
Aunt Mary winced and shivered.
“My heavens, Lucinda!” she exclaimed, sharply. “I wish’t there was a
school to teach outsiders the use of an ear-trumpet. They can’t seem to
hit the medium between either mumblin’ or splittin’ one’s ear drums.”
Lucinda was too much out of breath from her effort to attempt any
audible penitence. Her mistress continued:
“Well, you find him wherever he is, and tell him to harness up the
buggy and go and get Mr. Stebbins as quick as ever he can. Hurry!”
Lucinda exited with a promptitude that fulfilled all that her lady’s
heart could wish. She found Joshua whetting his scythe.
“She wants Mr. Stebbins right off,” said Lucinda.
“Then she’ll get Mr. Stebbins right off,” said Joshua. And he headed
immediately for the barn.
Lucinda ran along beside him. It did seem to Lucinda as if in
compensation for her slavery to Aunt Mary she might have had a
sympathizer in Joshua.
“I guess she wants to change her will,” she panted, very much out of
breath.
“Then she’ll change her will,” said Joshua. And as his steady gait was
much quicker than poor Lucinda’s halting amble, and as he saw no
occasion to alter it, the conversation between them dwindled into space
then and there.
Half an hour later Billy went out of the drive at a swinging pace and
an hour after that Mr. Stebbins was brought captive to Aunt Mary’s
throne.
She welcomed him cordially; Lucinda was promptly locked out, and then
the old lady and her lawyer spent a momentous hour together. Mr.
Stebbins was taken into his client’s fullest confidence; he was regaled
with enough of the week’s history to guess the rest; and he foresaw the
outcome as he had foreseen it from the moment of the rupture.
Aunt Mary was very sincere in owning up to her own past errors.
“I made a big mistake about the life that boy was leadin’,” she said in
the course of the conversation. “He took me everywhere where he was in
the habit of goin’, an’ so far from its bein’ wicked, I never enjoyed
myself so much in my life. There ain’t no harm in havin’ fun, an’ it
does cost a lot of money. I can understand it all now, an’ as I’m a
great believer in settin’ wrong right whenever you can, I want Jack put
right in my will right off. I want—” and then were unfolded the
glorious possibilities of the future for her youngest, petted nephew.
He was not only to be reinstated in the will, but he was to reign
supreme. The other four children were to be rich—very rich,—but Jack
was to be _the_ heir.
Mr. Stebbins was well pleased. He was very fond of Jack and had always
been particularly patient with him on that account. He felt that this
was a personal reward of merit, for it cannot be denied that Jack had
certainly cashed very large checks on the bank of his forbearance.
When all was finished, and Joshua and Lucinda had been called in and
had duly affixed their signatures to the important document, the buggy
was brought to the door again and Mr. Stebbins stepped in and allowed
himself to be replaced where they had taken him from.
Joshua returned alone.
“There, what did I tell you!” said Lucinda, who was waiting for him
behind the wood-house,—“she did want to change her will.”
“Well, she changed it, didn’t she?” said Joshua.
“I guess she wants to give him all she’s got, since that week in New
York,” said Lucinda.
“Then she’ll give him all she’s got,” said Joshua.
Lucinda’s eyes grew big.
“An’ she’ll give it to you, too, if you don’t look out and stay where
you can hear her bell if she rings it,” Joshua added, with his usual
frankness, and then he whipped up Billy and drove on to the barn.
Arethusa returned late in the afternoon, very warm, very wilted. Aunt
Mary looked over the cotton purchase, and deigned to approve.
“But, my heavens, Arethusa,” she exclaimed immediately afterwards, “if
you had any idea how dirty and dusty and altogether awful you do look,
you wouldn’t be able to get to soap and water fast enough.”
At that poor Arethusa sighed, and, gathering up her hat, and hat-pins,
and veil, and gloves, and purse, and handkerchief, went away to wash.
Chapter Twenty
Jack’s Joy
About the first of July many agreeable things happened.
One was that Mr. Stebbins found it advisable to address a discreet
letter to John Watkins, Jr., Denham, conveying the information that
although he must not count unduly upon the future, still, if he behaved
himself, he might with safety allow his expenditures to mount upward
monthly to a certain limit. This was the way in which Aunt Mary salved
her conscience and saved her pride all at once.
“I don’t want him to think that I don’t mean things when I say ’em,”
she had carefully explained to Mr. Stebbins, “but I can’t bear to think
that there’s anybody in New York without money enough to have a good
time there.”
Mr. Stebbins had made a note of the sum which the allowance was to
compass and had promised to write the letter at once.
“What did you do the last time you were in the city?” Aunt Mary asked.
“I was much occupied with business,” said the lawyer, “but I found time
to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art and—”
“Good gracious!” exclaimed Aunt Mary, “who was takin’ you ’round! I
never had a second for any museums or arts;—you ought to have seen a
vaudeville, or that gondola place! I was ferried around four times and
the music lasted all through.” She stopped and reflected. “I guess you
can make that money a hundred a month more,” she said slowly. “I don’t
want the boy to ever feel stinted or have to run in debt.”
Mr. Stebbins smiled, and the result was that Jack began to pay up the
bills for his aunt’s entertainment very much more rapidly than he had
anticipated doing.
Another pleasant thing was that a week or so later—very soon after Mrs.
Rosscott had given up her town house and returned to the protection of
the parental slate-tiles—Burnett’s father, a peppery but jovial old
gentleman (we all know the kind), suddenly asked why Bob never came
home any more. This action on the part of the head of the house being
tantamount to the completest possible forgiveness and obliviousness of
the past, Burnett’s mother, of whom the inquiry had been made, wept
tears of sincerest joy and wrote to the youngest of her flock to return
to the ancestral fold just as soon as he possibly could. He came, and
as a result, a fortnight later Jack came, and Mitchell came, and Clover
came. Mrs. Rosscott, as we have previously stated, was already there,
and so were Maude Lorne and a great many others. Some of the others
were pretty girls and Burnett and two of his friends found plenty to
amuse them, but Burnett’s dearest friend, his bosom friend, his Fidus
Achates, found no one to amuse him, because he was in earnest, and had
eyes for no feminine prettiness, his sight being dazzled by the
radiance of one surpassing loveliness. He had worked tremendously hard
the first month of daily laboring, and felt he deserved a reward. Be it
said for Jack that the reward of which Aunt Mary had the bestowing
counted for very little with him except in its relation to the far
future. The real goal which he was striving toward, the real laurels
that he craved—Ah! they lay in another direction.
Middle July is a lovely time to get off among the trees and grass, and
lie around in white flannels or white muslins, just as the case may be.
It was too warm to do much else than that, and Heaven knows that Jack
desired nothing better, as long as his goddess smiled upon him.
It was curious about his goddess. She seemed to grow more beautiful
every time that he saw her. Perhaps it was her native air that gave her
that charming flush; perhaps it was the joy of being at home again;
perhaps it was—no, he didn’t dare to hope that. Not yet. Not even with
all that she had done for him fresh in his memory. The humility of true
love was so heavy on his heart that his very dreams were dulled with
hopelessness, the majority of them seeming too vividly dyed in Paradise
hues for their fulfillment in daily life to ever appear possible. But
still he was very, very happy to be there with her—beside her—and to
hear her voice and look into her eyes whenever the trouble some “other
people” would leave them alone together. And she did seem happy, too.
And so rejoiced that the tide of Aunt Mary’s wrath had been
successfully turned. And so rejoiced that he was at work, even in the
face of her hopes as to his college career. And also so rejoiced to
take up the gay, careless thread of their mutual pleasure again.
The morning after the gathering of the party was Saturday and an ideal
day—that sort of ideal day when house parties naturally sift into pairs
and then fade away altogether. The country surrounding our particular
party was densely wooded and not at all settled, the woods were laid
out in a fascinating system of walks and benches which in no case
commanded views of one another, and the shade overhead was the shade of
July and as propitious to rest as it was to motion. Mitchell took a
girl in gray and two sets of golf clubs and started out in the opposite
direction from the links, Clover took a girl in green and a camera and
went another way, Burnett took a girl in a riding habit and two saddle
horses and followed the horses’ noses whither they led, and Jack—Jack
smoked cigarettes on the piazza and waited—waited.
Mrs. Rosscott came out after a while and asked him why he didn’t go to
walk also.
“Just what I was thinking as to yourself,” he said, very boldly as to
voice, and very beseechingly as to eyes.
“Oh, I’m so busy,” she said, laughing up into his eyes and then
laughing down at the ground—“you see I’m the only married daughter to
help mamma.”
“But you’ve been helping all the morning,” he complained, “and besides
how can you help? One would think that your mother was beating eggs or
turning mattresses.”
“I have to work harder than that,” said Mrs. Rosscott; “I have to make
people know one another and like one another and not all want to make
love to the same girl.”
“You can’t help their all wanting to make love to the same girl,” said
Jack; “the more you try to convince them of their folly the deeper in
love they are bound to fall. I’m an illustration of that myself.”
Mrs. Rosscott looked at him then and curved her mouth sweetly.
“You do say such pretty things,” she said. “I don’t see how you’ve
learned so much in so little time. Why, General Jiggs in there is three
times your age and he tangles himself awfully when he tries to be
sweet.”
“Perhaps his physician has recommended gymnastics,” said Jack.
“Perhaps,” said Mrs. Rosscott laughing, and then she turned as if to go
in.
“Oh, don’t,” said her lover, barring the way with great suddenness;
“you really mustn’t, you know. I’ve been patient for so long and been
good for so long and I must be rewarded—I really must. Do come out with
me somewhere—anywhere—for only a half-hour,—please.”
She looked at him.
“Won’t Maude do?” she asked.
“No, she won’t,” he said beneath his breath; “whatever do you suggest
such a thing for? You make me ready to tell you to your face that you
want to go as bad as I want you to go, but I shan’t say so because I
know too much.”
“You do know a lot, don’t you?” said she, with an expression of great
respect; “why, if you were to dare to hint to me that I wanted to go
out with you instead of staying in and talking Rembrandt with Mr.
Morley, I’d never forgive you the longest day I live.”
“I know you wouldn’t,” said he, “and you may be quite sure that I shall
not say it. On the contrary I shall merely implore you to forget your
own pleasure in consideration of mine.”
“I really ought to devote the morning to Mr. Morley,” she said
meditatively; “it’s such an honor his coming here, you know.”
“A little bit of a whiskered monkey,” said Jack in great disgust; “an
honor, indeed!”
“He’s a very great man,” said Mrs. Rosscott; “every sort of institution
has given him a few letters to put after his name, and some have given
him whole syllables.”
“You must get a straw hat, you know, or a sun-shade; it will be hot in
half an hour.”
“Oh, I couldn’t stay out half an hour; fifteen minutes would be the
longest.”
“All right, fifteen minutes, then, but do hurry.”
“I didn’t say that I would go,” she said, opening her eyes; “and yet I
feel myself gone.” She laughed lightly.
“Do hurry,” he pleaded freshly; “oh, I am so hungry to—”
She disappeared within doors and five minutes later came back with one
of those charming floppy English garden hats, tied with a muslin bow
beneath her dimpled chin.
“This is so good of me,” she said, as they went down the steps.
“Very good, heavenly good,” said Jack; and then neither spoke again
until they had crossed the Italian garden and entered the American
wood. She looked into his eyes then and smiled half-shyly and
half-provokingly.
“You are such a baby,” she said; “such a baby! Do ask me why and I’ll
tell you half a dozen whys. I’d love to.”
The path was the smoothest and shadiest of forest paths, the hour was
the sweetest and sunniest of summer hours, the moment was the brightest
and happiest of all the moments which they had known together—up to
now.
“Do tell me,” he said; “I’m wild to know.”
He took her hand and laid it on his arm. For that little while she was
certainly his and his alone, and no man had a better claim to her. “Go
on and tell me,” he repeated.
“There is one big reason and there are lots of little ones. Which will
you have first?”
“The little ones, please.”
“Then, listen; you are like a baby because you are impatient, because
you are spoilt, because when you want anything you think that you must
have it, and because you like to be walked with.”
“Are those the little reasons,” he said when she paused; “and what’s
the big one?”
“The big one,” she said slowly; “Oh, I’m afraid that you won’t like the
big one!”
“Perhaps it will be all the better for me if I don’t,” he laughed; “at
any rate I beg and pray and plead to know it.”
“What a dear boy!” she laughed. “If you want to know as badly as that,
I’d have to tell you anyhow, whether I wanted to or not. It’s because
I’m so much the oldest.”
“Oh!” said Jack, much disappointed. “Is that why?”
“And then too,” she continued, “you seem even younger because of your
being so unsophisticated.”
“So I am unsophisticated, am I?” he asked grimly.
“Yes,” she said nodding; “at least you impress me so.”
“I’m glad of that,” he said after a little pause.
She looked up quickly.
“Truly?”
“Yes, indeed.”
“Oh,” she laughed, “if you say that, then I shall know that you are
less unsophisticated than I thought you were.”
“Why so?” he asked surprised.
“Don’t you know that meek, mild men always try to insinuate that they
are regular fire-eaters, and vice versa? Well, it’s so—and it’s so
every time. There was once a man who was kissing me, and he drew my
hands up around his neck in such a clever, gentle way that I was
absolutely positive that he had had no end of practice drawing arms up
in that way and I just couldn’t help saying: ‘Oh, how many women you
must have kissed!’ What do you think he answered?—merely smiled and
said: ‘Not so many as you might imagine.’ He showed how much he knew by
the way he answered, for oh! he had. I found that out afterwards.”
“What did you do then?” he asked, frowning. “Cut him?”
“No; I married him. Why, of course I was going to marry him when he
kissed me, or I wouldn’t have let him kiss me. Do you suppose I let men
kiss me as a general thing? What are you thinking of?”
“I was thinking of you,” he said. “It’s a horrible habit I’ve fallen
into lately. But, never mind; keep on talking.”
“I don’t remember what I was saying,” she said. “Oh, yes, I do too.
About men, about good and bad men. Now, even if I didn’t know how much
trouble you’d made in the world, I’d divine it all the instant that you
were willing to admit being unsophisticated. People always crave to be
the opposite of what they are; the drug shops couldn’t sell any
peroxide of hydrogen if that wasn’t so.”
He laughed and forgot his previous vexation.
“Now, look at me,” she continued. “Oh, I didn’t mean really—I mean
figuratively; but never mind. Now, I’m nothing but a bubble and a toy,
and I ache to be considered a philosopher. Don’t you remember my
telling you what a philosopher I was, the very first conversation that
we ever had together? I do try so hard to delude myself into thinking I
am one, that some days I’m almost sure that I really am one. Last
night, for instance, I was thinking how nice it would be for my Cousin
Maude to marry you.”
“Ye gods!” cried Jack.
“She’s so very rich,” Mrs. Rosscott pursued calmly; “and you know the
law of heredity is an established scientific fact now, so you could
feel quite safe as to her nose skipping the next generation.”
Jack was audibly amused.
“It’s not anything to laugh over,” his companion continued gravely.
“It’s something to ponder and pray over. If I were Maude I should be on
my knees about it most of the time.”
“Nothing can help her now,” said Jack. “Her parents have been and gone
and done it, as far as she’s concerned, forever. Prayer won’t change
her nose, although age may broaden it still more.”
“Don’t you believe that nothing can help her now. A good-looking
husband could help her lots. I’ve seen homelier girls than she go just
everywhere—on account of their husbands, you know. That was where my
philosophy came in.”
“I’d quite forgotten your philosophy.” He laughed again as he spoke. “I
must apologize. Please tell me more about it.”
She laughed, too.
“I’m going to. You see, I was lying there, looking out at the moon, and
thinking how nice it would be for Maude to marry you.”
“Did you consider me at all?” he interposed.
“How you interrupt!” she declared, in exasperation. “You never let me
finish.”
“I am dumb.”
“Well, I thought how nice it would be for Maude to marry you. You’d
have a baron for a papa-in-law, and an heiress to balance Aunt Mary
with. If you went into consumption and had to retreat to Arizona for a
term of years, the climate could not ruin her complexion as it would
m—most people’s. And she’s so ready to have you that it’s almost
pathetic. I can’t imagine anything more awful than to be as ready to
marry a man who is’nt at all desirous of so doing, as Maude is of
marrying you. But if you would only think about it. I thought and
thought about it last night and the longer I thought the more it seemed
like such a nice arrangement all around; and then—all of a sudden—do
you know I began to wonder if I was philosopher enough to enjoy being
matron-of-honor to Maude and really—”
“At the wedding I could have kissed you!” he exclaimed, and suddenly
subsided at the look with which she withered his boldness.
“And really I wasn’t altogether sure; and then, it occurred to me that
nothing on the face of the earth would ever persuade you to marry
Maude. And I saw my card castle go smashing down, and then I saw that I
really am a philosopher, after all, for—for I didn’t mind a bit!”
Jack threw his head back and roared.
“Oh,” he said after a minute, “you are so refreshing. You ruffle me up
just to give me the joy of smoothing me down, don’t you?”
“I do what I can to amuse you,” she said, demurely. “You are my
father’s guest and my brother’s friend, and so I ought to—oughtn’t I?”
“Yes,” he said, “I have a two-fold claim on you if you look at it that
way and some day I mean to go to work and unfold still another.”
They had come to a delightful little nook where the trees sighed
gently, “Sit down,” and there seemed to be no adequate reason for
refusing the invitation.
“Let’s rest, I know you’re tired,” the young man said gently, and the
next minute found his companion down upon the soft grass, her back
against a twisted tree-root and her hands about her knees.
He threw himself down beside her and the hush and the song of
mid-summer were all about them, filling the air, and their ears, and
their hearts all at once.
Presently he took her hand up out of the grass where its fingers had
wandered to hide themselves, and kissed it. She looked at him
reprovingly when it was too late, and shook her head.
“Such a little one!” he said.
“I call it a pretty big one,” she answered.
“I mean the hand—not the kiss,” he said smiling.
“You really are sophisticated,” she told him. “Only fancy if you had
reversed those nouns!”
“I know,” he said; “but I’ve kissed hands before. You see, I’m more
talented than you think.”
“Don’t be silly,” she said smiling. “I really am beginning to think
very well of you. You don’t want me to cease to, do you?”
“Why do women always say ‘Don’t be silly’?” he queried. “I wish I could
find one who wanted to be very original, and so said, ‘Do be silly’,
just for a change.”
“Dear me, if women were to beg men to be silly what would happen?” Mrs.
Rosscott exclaimed. “The majority are so very foolish without any
special egging on.”
“But it is so dreadfully time-worn—that one phrase.”
“Oh, if it comes to originality,” she answered, “men are not original,
either. Whenever they lie down in the shade, they always begin to talk
nonsense. You reflect a bit and see if that isn’t invariably so.”
“But nonsense is such fun to talk in the shade,” he said, spreading her
fingers out upon his own broad palm. “So many things are so next to
heavenly in the shade.”
“You ought not to hold my hand.”
“I know it.”
“I am astonished that you do not remember your Aunt Mary’s teaching you
better.”
“She never forbade my holding your hand.”
“Suppose anyone should come suddenly down the path?”
“They would see us and turn and go back.”
“To tell everyone—”
“What?”
“A lie.”
Jack laughed, folded her hand hard in his, and drew himself into a
sitting posture beside her knee.
“Now, don’t be silly,” she said with earnest anxiety. “I won’t have it.
It’s putting false ideas in your head, because I’m really only playing,
you know.”
“The shadow of love,” he suggested.
“Quite so.”
“And if—” He leaned quite near.
“Not by any means,” she exclaimed, springing quickly to her feet.
“Come—come! It’s quite time that we were going back to the house.”
“Why must we?” he remonstrated.
“You know why,” she said. “It’s time we were being sensible. When a man
gets as near as you are, I prefer to be _en promenade_. And don’t let
us be foolish any longer, either. Let us be cool and worldly. How much
money has your aunt, anyhow?”
Jack had risen, too.
“What impertinence!” he ejaculated.
“Not at all,” she said. “Maude has so much money of her own that I ask
in a wholly disinterested spirit.”
“She’s very rich,” said Jack. “But if your spirit is so disinterested,
what do you want to know for?”
“This is a world of chance, and the main chance in a woman’s case is
alimony; so it’s always nice to know how to figure it.”
“It’s a slim chance for your cousin,” said Jack. “Do tell her that I
said so.”
“No, I shan’t,” said she perversely. “I won’t be a go-between for you
and her. Besides, as to that alimony, there are more heiresses than
Maude in our family.”
“Yes,” said he; “I know that. But I know, too, that there is one among
them who need never figure on getting any alimony out of me. If I ever
get the iron grasp of the law on that heiress, I can assure you that
only her death or mine will ever loosen its fangs.”
“How fierce you are!” said Mrs. Rosscott. “Why do you get so worked
up?”
“Oh,” he exclaimed, with something approaching a groan, “I don’t mean
to be—but I do care so much! And sometimes—” he caught her quickly in
his arms, drew her within their strong embrace, and kissed her
passionately upon the lips that had been tantalizing him for five
interminable months.
He was almost frightened the next second by her stillness.
“Don’t be angry,” he pleaded.
“I’m not,” she murmured, resting very quietly with her cheek against
his heart. “But you’ll have to marry me now. My other husband did, you
know.”
“Marry you!” he exclaimed. “Next week? To-morrow? This afternoon? You
need only say when—”
“Oh, not for years and years,” she said, interrupting him. “You mustn’t
dream of such a thing for years and years!”
“For years and years!” he cried in astonishment.
“That’s what I said,” she told him.
He released her in his surprise and stared hard at her. And then he
seized her again and kissed her soundly.
“You don’t mean it!” he declared.
“I do mean it!” she declared.
And then she shook her head in a very sweet but painfully resolute
manner.
“I won’t be called a cradle-robber,” she said, firmly; and at that her
companion swore mildly but fervently.
“You’re so young,” she said further; “and not a bit settled,” she
added.
“But you’re young, too,” he reminded her.
“I’m older than you are,” she said.
“I suppose that you aren’t any more settled than I am, and that’s why
you hesitate,” he said grimly.
“Now that’s unworthy of you,” she cried; “and I have a good mind—”
But the direful words were never spoken, for she was in his arms
again—close in his arms; and, as he kissed her with a delicious
sensation that it was all too good to be true, he whispered, laughing:
“I always meant to lord it over my wife, so I’ll begin by saying: ‘Have
it your own way, as long as I have you.’”
Mrs. Rosscott laid her cheek back against his coat lapel, and looked up
into his eyes with the sweetest smile that even he had ever seen upon
even her face.
“It’s a bargain,” she murmured.
Chapter Twenty-One
The Peace and Quiet of the Country
Along in the beginning of the fall Aunt Mary began suddenly to grow
very feeble indeed. After the first week or two it became apparent that
she would have to be quiet and very prudent for some time, and it was
when this information was imparted to her that the family discovered
that she had been intending to go to New York for the Horse-Show.
“She’s awful mad,” Lucinda said to Joshua. “The doctor says she’ll have
to stay in bed.”
“She won’t stay in bed long,” said Joshua.
“The doctor says if she don’t stay in bed she’ll die,” said Lucinda.
“She won’t die,” said Joshua.
Lucinda looked at Joshua and felt a keen desire to throw her flatiron
at him. The world always thinks that the Lucindas have no feelings; the
world never knows how near the flatirons come to the Joshuas often and
often.
Arethusa came for two days and looked the situation well over.
“I think I won’t stay,” she said to Lucinda, “but you must write me
twice a week and I’ll write the others.”
Then Arethusa departed and Lucinda remained alone to superintend things
and be superintended by Aunt Mary.
Aunt Mary’s superintendence waxed extremely vigorous almost at once.
She had out her writing desk, and wrote Jack a letter, as a consequence
of which everything published in New York was mailed to his aunt as
soon as it was off the presses. Lucinda was set reading aloud and,
except when the mail came, was hardly allowed to halt for food and
sleep.
“My heavens above,” said the slave to Joshua, “it don’t seem like I can
live with her!”
“You’ll live with her,” said Joshua.
“It’s more as flesh and blood can bear.”
“Flesh and blood can bear a good deal more’n you think for,” said
Joshua, and then he delivered up two letters and drove off toward the
barn.
“If those are letters,” said Aunt Mary from her pillow the instant she
heard the front door close, “I’d like ’em. I’m a great believer in
readin’ my own mail, an’ another time, Lucinda, I’ll thank you to bring
it as soon as you get it an’ not stand out on the porch hollyhockin’
with Joshua for half an hour while I wait.”
Lucinda delivered up the letters without demanding what species of
conversational significance her mistress attached to the phrase,
“holly-hocking.”
Aunt Mary turned the letters through eagerly.
“My lands alive!” she said suddenly, “if here isn’t one from
Mitchell,—the dear boy. Well, I never did!—Lucinda, open the blinds to
the other window, too—so I—can—see to—” her voice died away,—she was
too deep in the letter to recollect what she was saying.
Mitchell wrote: